


The Prices We Pay

by Talonpoppy



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Don't worry, F/F, I probably can't either, I'll probably have many regrets later, If you can't make sense of this, Or a doctor, Reasons to why I should have my laptop taken away, This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things, Trying to figure out what I'm doing, i'm not a scientist
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-25
Updated: 2017-08-06
Packaged: 2018-12-06 16:32:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11604507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talonpoppy/pseuds/Talonpoppy
Summary: A faulty biotic round? What's the worst that can happen?





	1. Trouble lurks in the simplists of forms

**Author's Note:**

> Just a fair warning owo I am not bilingual . . . I can barely work with my first language o wo, so I apologize in advance if I mis-use any terms that appear in other languages.

 

“Justice Rains From Above!” The glint of sun gleamed off of the blue mech suit, allowing only a quick sign of the attacker, before those below had a rocket barrage come down on their heads with unyielding vengeance.

“Could she be any louder?” A low, gargled voice grumbles as the speaker dives for cover. 

“Eh, Gabe, least you got out of the way right?” The first speaker growls something about calling them Gabe before he dives for the attacker two guns aimed straight for the blue and gold helmet. 

“Let’s clear the skies!” 

“Let’s clear the skies together!” The blue warrior shoots back at the gunman with a new ferocity as a light blue glow gingerly floats around them. 

“Sombra. . . “ 

“Been here all along.” The blue light vanishes as a small squeak accents a sudden burst of gunfire. 

“Angela!” The blue warrior struggles to even catch a glimpse of her companion as she pushes back the opposing gunman. 

“I have you covered.” A crouched sniper fixes her gaze on the two feuding woman below. In a quick automatic motion, she loads a cartridge into her rifle and takes aim. 

The young latina woman dubbed, Sombra smiles as she guns down the mostly defenseless Angela Ziegler, who seems rather unsteady with the system lock out Sombra has placed on her Valkyrie swift-responce suit. 

“Ay, Pobrecita.” She mocks as Angela draws her Caduceus Blaster in an effort of self defense. Sombra nimbly knocks the gun aside as she draws herself up close to Angela, “Checkmate doc.”

A small piff is the only warning the two have as a barrage of quick fire shots rain upon the two.

“Watching your back.” The sniper clicks into the com channel as she aims at the hacker’s hands in hopes to immobilize them long enough so that Angela could escape. The doctor jumps out of the fray as Sombra retreats holding her hands as she pulls out the syringe like bullet. 

Angela reaches back to pull a similar container from just behind her shoulder blades. The pain was minimal as the nanites began their repair work on the small array of injuries, but it still stung nonetheless.

“We’re out of time.” An opposing sniper clips into her com as she drops from her perch. The clear displeasure of the situation settling as a frown on her pale blue lips. “The objective is lost.”

The gunman grunts as he fades into a shadow of himself to slip away, the latina follows in short suit, her form vanishing in a digital flare. 

“We best get a move on.” The blue warrior notes, “even if we’re just trying to help, the PETRAS Act would see us imprisoned.” 

“Ana being on the local watch list wouldn’t help us prove our case.” Angela jokes as she dusts herself off. “Though Fareeha’s right, we should be on our way out of here.”

“I’d have liked for a world where my daughter could live a peaceful life Ms.Ziegler.” Ana Amari warns in a stern tone, “a vision I’m still fighting for.” 

“Must violence always be the solution? Peace can be achieved in other ways” The doctor shoots back.

“Shouldn’t we focus more on escaping than arguing over this. . .again?” Fareeha Amari asks in a exasperated voice, as she ignites her rocket pack and jumps to a building overhead; throwing a gesture for Angela to follow while Ana worked on sneaking away in the back alleys. 

“Radio silence till the rendezvous point.” Ana’s voice buzzes over the com system before fizzling out as the sniper deactivates her com device.

Fareeha sucks in her breathe as the doctor glides beside her; she’d come to recognize a lament of peace expersion. “She tries her best you know.” 

“By taking technology meant for healing and using it for mercenary tactics?” Angela growls.

“You know you didn’t have to co-” Fareeha starts.

“Fareeha, I’m not about to let you get hurt, Talon’s vicious. Your mother knows that first hand. I don’t need two people walking around with eye patches you know.” Angela ends her statement with a soft joke, signaling to the blue warrior that, to her relief, it wasn’t going to be one of the nights she’d go off for hours explaining diplomatic solutions to the world’s problems. Truthfully Fareeha didn’t need that sort of migraine tonight.

“Well, they always did say Justice is blind right?” Fareeha furrows her eyebrows after a few seconds with no response from Angela, had she upset her again? “Angela, you know I wasn’t bei-” Fareeha feels her heart pound heavily as she looks around for her companion. “Angela?” She says with concern, each letter escalating with her heart. In what feels like time dragging on, the woman spots a plummeting white shape.

“ANGELA!”


	2. In love’s arms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Angel's fall from the sky?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> owo As in the first chapter,head's up I'm not bilingual, so please, don't burn me if I've put any terms in the wrong place -w-

“Fareeha, really, you should put that down.” Fareeha Amari doesn’t even flinch as a gloved hand grasps her shoulder, the woman’s gaze is transfixed on the Caduceus Staff, lost in a waking nightmare. “Fareeha. . “ Ana rubs her daughter’s shoulders in a hesitant fashion. 

“It always works. It should’ve worked. . .” Fareeha’s mind plays the events that slowly transpired after Angela had fallen unconscious while the two were up in the sky. 

\---

“ANGELA!” The words echo in the dive, panic gives way to determination as Fareeha tucks her arms in and plummets like a rocket to get ahead of the falling Angela. Slowly, at least what feels as such to Fareeha, she pulls beside the plummeting doctor; air pushes roughly around the two as the ground becomes ever apparent to at least one of the falling duo.

\---

Fareeha clicks the Caduceus Staff to active a warm glow that seeps into the air, the light spreading like fireflies around the silent soldier. Ana looks at her daughter in dismay. Her actions were reasonable, in times of peace one is allowed to grieve. To collect their thoughts so that they may regain their footing and head out once again. 

A hard collection of stone is what makes a soldier, but if one is to stand in the waters of time and never move, never flinch or allow a breath, that river will consume them; breaking their shell and slowly wearing away at their form until they are nothing but the sand that softens the enemies footsteps. But what mother would want a life like that for her daughter? Stories of heroes, bravery and hope, what things to fill a child's head with.

Yet . . .

Does anyone ever tell about the loss? When those you love are taken because you’re a threat, a beacon that stains the lives of others with red. And if you’re not strong enough?  
Ana’s gaze passes over to the sleeping doctor. Her chest falls and rises in a slow paced motion,the same pace it’d kept for the last few days since her daughter’s return. 

\----

Fareeha’s mind still was lost in the moment that had already passed. The seconds that screamed like the air thundering into her headgear as she tried to wake her unconscious companion. The stone of emotion that fell with her as she gripped a tool she’d seen used to heal and save many lives, but even the slow glow of a falling star failed to wake her friend.  
Too close was the ground, too slow where Fareeha’s hands to the controls of her suit. All she could do was wrap her love in her arms as the two rammed into the unforgiving pavement below.

\---

And back to the moment, the realization of reality. The waking of being wrapped in bandages, arm locked in a form of plaster, and the sleeping face of an unwaking Angel. Fareeha pulls the staff closer to her chest as if that’d wake her, as if holding a small piece of the doctor’s work and labor could undo any damage that no one could figure out how to reverse. 

\---

“The nanites appear to be inducing the coma, we aren’t sure how this occurred, but we are trying to help reverse the process to at least form a state of consciousness.” The doctor had looked uneasy as he had broke the news to Fareeha, “Dr.Ziegler was the top in this field, much of her research could be duplicated, but I’m afraid only she had a true grasp of this shaky medical field.” The words echo hollowly through her mind, like a shadow pushing her further into a pain she’d felt once before. 

“Fareeha.” The woman slowly falls into her mother’s chest, her face a numb expression of one who has given everything and can handle pain no longer. “Sleep now ḥabībti.” The old soldier pets her daughter’s hair slowly as she cradles the grieving woman into her lap, a comforting lullaby calls through the air, beckoning the mentally and emotionally exhausted warrior to sleep. 

Fareeha gradually relaxes into her mother, her eyes fighting to stay awake, just as they’d done when she was a child listening to Reinhardt's stories. But just as in the past, her eyes closed and breathing deepened as she fell into slumber. 

Ana pushes the hair away from her daughter’s face in a smooth, loving motion. The Udjat just below Fareeha’s right eye, catches her attention for just a moment, lending a smile to her lips as she brushes the mirrored tattoo just below her own eye. “Whom protects who now?” She murmurs as she removes a small note from her pocket, the old soldier stays with her daughter,reveling for just a few minutes longer; before, carefully she pulls away.

“I will always love you Fareeha. May I find answers in the times you need them.” The elderly woman tucks the small piece of paper into the small pocket on Fareeha’s shirt before pecking a kiss on her daughter’s forehead and vanishing into the frost riddled night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Into the cold water's do I plunge owo, for those wondering, yes Angela is currently in a coma. Why did I put her in a coma? o wo well other than I'm a terrible person, I wanted to just play around with a few ideas I had, sides ow o "Drama," as they say. 
> 
> Quick note to Ana. In case one didn't get the jist of my insanity, Ana is beginning her own search on what went wrong to cause our lovable doctor to be in the state she's in. So, expect to see some interesting faces fairly soon. (Well that is, if I update this often Owo, who knows?) 
> 
> Anyway, again thanks for reading. Seeing as this is chapter 2 owo I appriciate your dedication to my madness.


	3. Days alone, My heart’s a battleground

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What do you mean think happy thoughs?

Fareeha Amari looks hazily at the soft glow of the machines scattered around the room, each beeps in a strange way, montering a sleeping woman. They offer a colorful suggestion too the otherwise vacant expression of grays and whites that make up a majority of the room. 

The tired soldier examines her friend’s face; a craft of effortless peace, which, for her, was as foreign as the streaks of red that lined the cheeks of the soldier almost weekly. Fareeha could no longer count the days she’d spent coming back and forth between being a strong commander, and breaking down at a bedside each night. 

“Want to know the forecast?.” Fareeha starts with the only thing that had ever received a response from the doctor, it’d been a small smile, a slight turn of the lips, but the hope that had followed burned softly in the words. 

The gentle beep of the monitors and soft breath of the lost, was all she receives. One she’d become far to comfortable with, a comfort of pain and a soft throb as hope seeps away, like the slip of the woman’s shoulders as she continues a conversation leading nowhere, meant for one that she wasn’t sure was even listening.

“Well. . .the sky was cloudy today. Made it hard to see the sun, not that that’s not welcomed. Heaven knows armor can get pretty hot if not managed well. . .” Fareeha covers her eyes as she leans forward, the familiar weight beginning to press upon her chest, “things have been a bit hectic since Talon’s infiltration.” Her hand slowly moves down to grip her shirt, already her words began to come along as choked. “Heck, I’m surprised they’ve let me come as often as I have. . .” Words fall away as Fareeha clenches her wavering jaw and turns away, salty droplets already finding their paths down the woman’s dark cheeks.

“Mother always warned of the burdens one carries for peace. The prices we must pay for it.” Fareeha’s words are soft and garbled with the strain of tears, “I never imagined you’d be one. 

\- - -

“Doc still asleep?” Fareeha Amari lifts her head sleepily from the hospital chair she’d been perched on. The speaker, lays a small bundle of white lilies on the soldier’s lap before taking the open seat next to her. A calm sympathetic smile greet’s Fareeha as she meets the speaker’s gaze, speaking more words with her eyes, than any that could come to her lips.

“Right. . .” The woman sighs as she pulls her legs up to her chest to observe the sleeping doctor. “She’s come back from worse luv. Dr.Ziegler’s been putting herself on the front lines form even before I was a field agent!”

“Lena. . .it was through the aid of her work that let her come back.” The soldier stares blankly at the wall across from her, “she’s the master, only she’d know how to fix this. But . . “ Her gaze drops back to Angela, “she can’t solve this. . .”

Lena Oxton pats Fareeha softly on the shoulder, “then believe she’ll make it through this. Time will tell, just gotta wait it out mate.” 

“Right.” Fareeha’s tone muffles as she returns to staring at her sleeping angel via the armrest. The air of conversation stales with the continued silence of both parties, one is too withdrawn to attempt even a start to any new ideas, while the other is too unsure of what to say to the other. 

“Winston sends his wishes.” Lena offers Fareeha a sorrow filled grin as she blinks out of the room.

\- - -

Fareeha leans back into the chair, alone again. The hospital staff had long since cleared out for the weekend nightshift, leaving maybe one nurse and an overly booked doctor behind to deal with the less stress filled wards. 

Not that it bothered her much. Sometimes it was hard to tell if she wasn’t apart of the decore anymore, with how often she’d be perched in the stressed folding chair next to the doctor’s bed, lost in her thoughts as she continued a restless watch.

“I wonder if mother is well?” She ponders to herself. Anna Amari hadn’t come into contact with Fareeha since she left her with a short letter explaining that she felt responsible for Angela’s condition, and would attempt to find any leads onto what caused her biotic round to give such a response. 

Anna could take care of herself, Fareeha knew that very well, but she’d thought she lost her once, and with Angela’s condition, it was easy to fall into darker ideas of others well being.

Fareeha pushes her head into the nook of her elbow, she could use her mother’s presence right now. Her understanding,her humour, her gentle shove towards being strong, but also letting herself be the shoulder others could cry on. 

The soldier’s breathe heaves with dry tears as her mind taunts her with Angela’s warm laugh, her gentle look of annoyance whenever Fareeha tried to hide her injuries from the doctor, even the quarrels over their ideals for peace and justice lingered as a pained echo. Just to hear the doctor’s voice came out as a faded blurred, replaced with only the beep of a monitor and exhale of one captured in death’s illusion.

Slowly, as the room falls under the moon’s shadow, the lone soldier’s gaze blurs and gives way to a temporary mimic of her companion’s state.

\- - - 

“Beep! Beep!” 

Fareeha is jarred awake at the disrupting new sound that rose above the normal rhythmic rotation of noises one would normally hear in a hospital room. Spinning her gaze around the room, she feels her breath lodge deep within her throat, there at the window, Angela Ziegler stood, staring out at the cityscape below.

Was she dreaming again? The warrior ponders and she drowsily shoves herself from the groaning chair. Another sweet nightmare to crush her hopes?

“Angela?” Fareeha approaches the woman hesitantly, the doctor gives Fareeha no response as she turns away from the window and walks towards the room door. “Angela?” Fareeha repeats a little louder in hopes to be heard over the incessant wail of monitors. Why isn’t any staff coming in to check up on this? The woman ponders and she stalks the unresponsive doctor through the halls of the hospital. 

The eerie silence of the halls and lack of life leads Fareeha to only grow in doubt of her reality.

“Another dream.” She mutters to herself as she feels her heart twist. “Why must these lucid mirages haunt me.” Slowly the warrior finds the distance between herself and the doctor growing as her steps become more sluggish. Soft wet droplets line her wake as she finally stops, her legs giving under the mental pressure of enduring another teasing hope. 

“Can’t this all just stop?” She sputters to the floor her teeth clench as silent tears pool beneath her. “Why can’t my dreams be something other than these nightmares?”

“Amari?” A gruff voice questions as loud footsteps trudge down the hallway, accompanied by the gentle slap of barefeet. Fareeha doesn’t move, her body tenses in an emotion she hadn’t felt in a long while.

“How dare you!” Her movement is sudden and vicious as the warrior springs at the location she estimated the voice to have come from. Her shoulder rams into the wall, touching only the smokey illusion of the being that had been there moments prior.

“You look so much like your mother.” 

“Don’t speak her name. You betrayed all she ever believed in Gabriel Reyes!”

The shadow of a man grabs Fareeha’s arm and twists it behind her back as his form solidifies. Shoving her into the wall he growls,“Not that I’d love to see what you could do out of you mec little Amari, it’s not you I came here to see.”

Fareeha’s eyes are wild as she catches sight of the Angela standing just behind the man. That’s when she notices, Angela’s eyes are shut. Was she sleep walking? Wait is that possible? 

“Fareeha. Listen-” Gabriel starts.

“I will have no words from you!” Fareeha roars as she attempts to escape Reaper’s hold. But her struggles are useless, Gabriel held the upper hand of surprise and with Fareeha’s mind locked in rage, any true strategy that could have offered a solution was snuffed out.

Gabriel sighs, it was useless attempting conversation with this child. He had much more pressing matters than one emotionally unbalanced soldier. He needed someone who he wasn’t even sure was able to help him, or if she was, to if she’d be willing to help him.

Gentle footsteps go unheard by the two as Fareeha continues her struggles and strings of words that Anna would surely hang her by the ears for stating. Slowly a dizzy conscious is found as Angela Ziegler hears the muffled quarrel. “Wha-” The doctor questions as she sways heavily, surprised to find herself on her feet. Shapes gain form and sluggishly the doctor comes to recognize the two struggling forms.

“Fareeha?” Her voice is soft and rough, barely even getting past her lips before she crumples to the floor.

Both parties look at the doctor who stares weakly back at the two. Fareeha felt numb, her attention completely lost even as Gabriel pulls his grip away. All fight was gone as she stumbled towards Angela. 

Gabriel approaches hesitantly, “Dr.Ziegler.” Angela gives Gabriel a tired, questioning look, offering a slow nod for him to continue, “I am in need of your assistance.” 

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Anna holds out her hand; the snow pushes against the extended limb in a passive embrace, each cold wet droplet rubs smoothly as it creates a thin crisp line down her fingers. The old soldier watches the pattern swirl around her arm while she contemplates over ideas that work to blur themselves inside her mind, like the flurry around her.

Of all places, it’d had to be northern England in the dead of winter for her first lead. In a snow storm of all things. “This is much better than a cabana on the beach.” She grumbles as the wind bites at her nose. 3 months to the date, and just now a shaky lead, that led her to a blizzard. 

The old soldier trudges into a run down village. While the majority of the scenery is blotched out by white, anyone person could see that the place had been hit hard by the first omnic crisis. Scattered machinery lingers the surroundings of rotting buildings, all forgotten in a panic and left in a painful memory. A story not too uncommon in this time of shaky peace.

Anna walks through the town trying her best to avoid soaking in too much of the scenery, she couldn’t be lost in the past, not now. She slows at a building that looked like any other of the scattered messes around the street. Looking at her small holo-pad she notes the number and pushes the surprisingly intact door open.

“Rather risky com’in here on such short notice.” A gruff looking man taps his hands on the counter, “what can I do ya for Shrike?”

Anna readjusts her mask, “I need to get in contact with the person who makes my surrounds.”

The man leans back, “You know how we deal Shrike. Can’t go loosing any suppliers or buys due to me not being able to keep confidentiality.”

“I was given a defective shot.” Anna presses, her voice keeping the tone of authority, but also hinting at aggravation. She was not in the mood to have another lead go cold (quite literally), especially after having to track through highly hostile conditions to get it in the first place.

The man’s composure and expression stay the same, “Well now I can’t fix that, you wanted a warranty, heh, we both know this ain’t the place.” Slowly the man folds his hands, “now if that’s all you came for, the door’s behind ya.”

Anna is rigid for a few moments more as she gathers her scattered thoughts. Aggressively, she slams a few select bills in front of the man, “Just pass it along that a buyer of there’s got a defective shot. I’m certain you can do that much.”

The woman turns and shoves herself out the door into the flurry, the shopkeeper’s taunting call of, “I'll think bout’ it darlin.” sounding in micking furry to her thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am totally not crying. . . *sniffles*
> 
> I had a lot of fun writing this section, it was fun to think about what Fareeha might do in this situation after months of it going on. 
> 
> Sorry to those who may have wanted the whole comatose thing to last a bit longer O.o I just honesly couldn't think of any good thing to write about to have an inbetween (I'm honestly not wanting to step on too many toes in lore interactions. Since I am setting this (sorta) in the world that overwatch's story is based in and haven't gone too far off the rocker (yet), I am trying to keep it fairly close to what could be happening in the world at the time. Plus the fact is, we don't know much about Overwatch's world yet, so, I'm too nervous to play with those type of ideas) 
> 
> Thank you again for reading, I am working on future chapters and will release them when I complete em. Any comments or critques are always apprciated! Have a great day.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! It appears you’ve made it to the end of the piece, I do hope you enjoyed it. Any comments or critiques will be appreciated, always am looking to improve my writing in any way owo. I will warn to any person who jumped in expected some “bed room” scenes, I’m not really that type of writer. I hope to work on the relationship between the two characters, rather than activities that some relationships can have. In short don’t expect sex scenes owo;, I have no experience in that field, nor do I have any intention of looking into it anytime soon ow o.
> 
> Special thanks to my twin, who gave me support with this insane idea. o w o


End file.
